


Five Seconds to Erase a Smile

by Talullah



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-22
Updated: 2014-08-22
Packaged: 2018-02-14 06:15:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2181075
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Talullah/pseuds/Talullah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A little UST between Dean and Bobby and a few unanswered questions. (It's a little disjointed - it's been a while since I last improved.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Seconds to Erase a Smile

**Author's Note:**

> This piece was not betaed!
> 
> Written for the contrelamontre challenge for October 20th 2008: aftermaths, 37 minutes.
> 
> Spoilers for SPN S04E06 - Yellow Fever.
> 
> [Disclaimer/Blanket Statement](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Talullah/profile)

"Adorable."

That's what Bobby said and now he wonders if he said it right. Of course Dean knows it was just teasing and besides, the boy sees him as a father - he said it himself, fresh from hell: "You're the closest thing I have to a father." Bobby relaxes behind the wheel: Dean and Sam know that he would never actually say 'adorable' with any intent other than sarcasm. Adorable is for kittens and little girls, not for someone as butch as Dean.

Bobby sighs and presses the gas. He has to go home and do stuff. Was it his impression or was there something odd about Sam? He'd rather not know, at least not right now. John was a selfish bastard and because of him those boys will never have a normal life but normal is overrated. The old bastard was right about one thing, though: there may still come the day when Dean will have to do 'something' about Sam and Bobby doesn't like to think about what that something might be and if Dean will be able to do it.

Thinking about Dean, he snorts. The boy has angels on his side. _Angels._ Go figure. Dean never believed he deserved saving, the stupid boy, because of that unspoken thing, the only secret they shared together, the thing that Dean had never told John or even Sam.

Bobby shrugged and turned on the radio. He had the boy's affection, his respect and his trust. That was enough. Had to be.

It had been fun to drive the Impala, though. It was a beautiful machine and Dean kept it in perfect condition. What a wonderful mechanic the boy would have been in another life. Bobby also had the opportunity to cast a few protection spells when Sam was doing his business at the mill. Not that Sam would be a danger to Dean. Bobby bit his lip. He wouldn't. But there was no harm in giving the boys a little hand with things.

Bobby switched stations and tried to focus on the news. Damned Winchesters were always on his mind.

* * *

"Adorable."

Dean bit a smile and looked away from Bobby and from Sam who chuckled. Of course Bobby was teasing; Dean knew he was being a fucking school girl with a crush but he couldn't help himself. He loved the old man. Well, not that old, even considering that he could be his father and generally behaved as if he was. Dean was glad to have him. He had loved and respected John Winchester as much as any son can love and respect a father but Bobby offered solidity, a sense of home and permanence that John had deliberately eradicated from their lives to keep them sharp.

Still... that winter when Dean was fifteen and John had taken them to live on Bobby's shed because they were too low on money and there was something that needed hunting and the feds were hot on their necks for the credit card scams, that winter had changed something.

Dean wasn't stupid or inexperienced. He knew, as an adult man, that it is perfectly normal for boys to feel confused and to look at other boys without that meaning anything. Back in the day, Bobby was leaner, taller than Dean, funny, learned and an adult who didn't boss him around and treated him like an equal. Dean revelled in his company, working in the scrap yard after school just to have a chance to chat a little with Bobby. He became infatuated. It happened. It just wasn't supposed to last for a life time.

Spring come, John had taken them away and life had returned to normal. Dean often wondered if someone as clever as Bobby hadn't figured out how he felt. The next time they had met, just before Dean turned eighteen, his cheeks had warmed a little when Bobby had hugged him. Bobby never gave anything away and quickly there was a relaxed, mature friendship building between them. Sam was growing up fast and Dean had his hands full with teenage dramas and buffering the rising tension between him and John. Bobby watched and occasionally offered him a glass of whiskey or tipped him extra for the day's work and told him to go to a bar and find a girl. Dean always did as he was told even when he'd rather stay in and chat. It was safer and better for everyone.

Then Dean had been twenty-two and John was away and Sam was in college, steadily forgetting them. In one lousy weekend, the world had fallen on his head and the only person he had thought to call for help was Bobby. Bobby did what had to be done, never said a word of recrimination and God knew that Dean had deserved it. This guilt, he would have to carry it forever.

That weekend had been the end of it. He still respected Bobby as a hunter, loved him almost as much as he did John and still thought on occasion on what it would feel like to hold Bobby in his arms as more than a friend... but now he knew that this would never happen, not with someone who knew what he was, what he had done.

Still, now and then he got carried away: Bobby had said he was adorable, obviously dripping sarcasm and good-fun, nothing else and Dean, almost in his thirties, had made a fake angry face, trying to avoid the giggle that was ready to burst out. He was actually glad that Bobby had gone away right after. He loved the man in ways that were too twisted to describe. The best was to just ignore it.

Sam was talking to him, and suddenly the warm glow gave way to disquiet. Something in Sam's voice was off and that yellow glint in his eyes... Panic tightened Dean's chest as he tried to rationalize it: it was a reflex of the sun; it was a hallucinatory aftershock; it was something else, just not that, not his worst fear.

He swallowed the fear and joked but what he saw in Sam's eyes was more an 'I'll play along for now' than an 'I'm your brother and we're just having fun'. Dean looked away, unable to completely hide the unease.

A thought of Bobby flashed in his mind: could he tell him this? No, of course not. Either Bobby would rule it as a hallucination or he'd be worried and suspecting Sam. Dean's first loyalty was still to Sam, but in moments like these, he felt more alone than ever. What was he to do now?

Sam walked to the other side of the car and got in. Dean took the cooler from the driver's seat and followed him. They drove to the motel weighed by heavy silence, all the buzz of a good hunt dissipated, all the glee at an inconsequent, barely-there flirt from an old crush forgotten. Dean side glanced at Sam who peacefully smiled as if nothing out of the ordinary had passed. Yes, it had been a hallucination. And Bobby had meant nothing. Everything was as it had always been. 'Everything is okay,' he said to himself. He knew that if he repeated it often enough it would eventually be true.

 

_Finis  
October 2008_


End file.
